20.380 to Mars!

And that’s a wrap folks. This fall, our 20.380 Biological Engineering Design students took on the theme of ‘Harnessing Biological Engineering to Enable to the Journey to or Settlement of Mars.” The student teams tackled designs focused on 1) enriching foods for the production of critical nutrients, closed-loop, 2) microbial systems for clearing perchlorate from Martian regolith (soil) and developing nitrogen feedstocks, 3) a medical device system to monitor thyroid function in response to acute and sustained exposure to perchlorate (those pesky Martian dust storms!) and 4) a medical device focused on quantitative monitoring of mental health biomarkers that can be used on Mars, the ISS, or on Earth. My colleagues and I are so proud of the 20.380 students this year and they have inspired us to be more thoughtful about how we in BE can engage our colleagues in other departments, like Aero/Astro, to use biological design approaches to impact the world (or Mars).